Paired Stats: Using Stats for Multiple Purposes.

 I'm gonna detail the process of how I've been dealing with ability scores for the past few years and put it all in one place I can point back to, because I've had a decent number of discussions about it at this point.

The core of the system, is to have a stat which can be beneficial on either end of the axis. A good visual example of this would be a Size stat.

• When your Size stat is big, so are you.
• When your Size stat is small, you are too.

You could make this function as a single attribute, one that you test in order to do big person things, which small people can't do as well (because they're not big).However, this can also test another aspect of your character: how good they are at doing small person things.

The easiest way to model this is with the following relationship:

• When trying to do a big person thing, roll under your Size score.
• When trying to do a small person thing, roll over your Size score.

These kinds of stats represent your character in very clear ways, for some examples that aren't Size:

• Barachus the Barbarian  has a very high Will score of 16, this means he is very independently minded and proud, but maybe finds it hard to connect with others.
• Lorena the warrior has a less than average Will score of 6, this means she is somewhat easily swept away by fads, and finds it somewhat easy to relate to others through shared experiences.

Handling Derivatives

Many systems operate under a basis of "derived stats" which are pulled from your base stats, which is something that would be difficult to model using stats in this way. So how do you deal with that?

https://anydice.com/program/2c198

An anydice comparison between standard stat distributions, and generic derived stat distributions.

The easiest way to do it, I think, is to declare the intent of any given derived stat to one aspect of each of your stats. That was a bad way to put it though, what I mean by that is this:

• Hitting people and making it hurt is something Big people are good at, so instead of an attack stat, you can simply roll under your Size score to make an attack.
• Avoiding people is something Small people are good at, so instead of a stealth stat, you can roll over your Size score to hide from someone.
• Assuredness in self is something Proud people are good at, so instead of a Save stat, you can roll under your Will score to subvert your fate by force of will.
• Understanding of people's motives is something Understanding people are good at, so instead of an initiative stat, you can roll over your Will stat to act first when a negotiation becomes a fight.

There might be a better way to do this, but it's generally easy to apply things to one aspect or another of a given axis.

The Glaring Issue That I hate but Deal With Anyways

Here's the chance a character with a perfectly average and normal Size stat of 10  has to do a big person thing:

• 50%

Now here's the chance they have to do a small person thing:

• 55%

Where the hell did that come from?

Well, I'll try and model this with a little diagram, please bear with me.

Because the number 10 is included regardless of whether you're rolling over or under, rolling over will add an extra 5% chance of success to the roll. This still plays nice overall, as the inverse is true for the number 11, both of which are the most likely results of a 3d6 distribution. It does, however, mean that no character will ever have a perfect 50-50 chance of success at a given task.

That's everything I have to say for now.

UPDATED: GLoG Wizard Chassis: the Soulcaster

Starting Gear: Ceremonial Garb (identifies you as a soulcaster), knife, birdcage.

[A]: Tethered Souls, Spells +1 MD

[B]: Soul Vision, +1 MD

[C]: Spiritual Shunting, Astral Travels +1 MD

[D]: Vomit Soul, +1 MD

Tethered Souls

You can tether additional souls to your body, allowing you to cast them as spells. You begin play with two spells from your school, determined randomly. And generate both their spirit score and personality.

Whenever you level up, if you visit a center dedicated to your tradition, you can roll for an additional spell from your starting spell list.

Spells

You cast spells with a number of dice called Magic Dice, or MD. A level one Soulcaster begins play with one MD. You can invest as many MD into a spell as you currently have. Each time a spent MD rolls a 3-6, it is depleted for the day and can no longer be used.

Whenever you roll doubles, roll on the disobediences table. Which table you roll on depends on whether that spell likes you.

When you roll triples, the spell you are currently casting wrests control over your body. If this ever happens with the same spell twice, this effect is permanent.

Soul Vision

You can see the souls inside living beings. This allows you to see whether or not a creature has a soul, as well as allowing you to see where an invisible being would be.

Additionally, you can pick up on small markings within wildlife areas that tell you when you're in a Guardian Spirit's territory.

Spiritual Shunting

You can shift unwanted curses or pacts onto the spirits who are tethered to you, make sure to keep track of these. If a spirit with curses or pacts placed on it has taken you over, you regain any of those attached afflictions. Additionally, if a spell-soul of yours breaks a pact you have made, they are affected by that pact. It should go without saying that using this effect on one of your spell-spirits will cause them to dislike you.

Astral Travels

You can choose to enter the astral realm in whatever way your practice allows you to, bringing you to a cosmic realm wherein the true forms of spirits reside. Your Spell-Souls guide you on this journey, with all that implies. In this realm, it can be far easier to seek out and speak with particular spirits, even from great distances.

Vomit Soul

You gain the ability to cast your own soul out of your body. This takes the form of one of this class' Pinnacle Spells, chosen at random. Each time you do this, there is a 1-in-6 chance one of the other souls you have tethered to yourself will take control over your body, this chance increases by one for each spell-soul you have that actively hates you. When this happens, you gain that spell's Spirit score and personality.

Pinnacle Spell List (1d6)

1.  Deluge - An area of [dice] mile radius centered on yourself receives heavy rain for [dice] days. If cast with one [die], clouds gather over the course of [least] days, to steadily rain on the target area for the duration. If cast with two, clouds hurry to the area on sudden winds over [least] hours. If cast with three, the clouds are visibly dragged across the sky within [least] minutes. Casting with four [dice] will cause you to expel dark storm clouds which form immediately, and the duration is extended to [sum] days.
2. Fireball - An explosion is called at a point [sum] feet from the caster that has a [dice]*5 foot radius. Any creatures caught within the explosion immediately incurs a Serious wound. Breakable structures are blasted away.
3. Love and Death - If [sum] exceeds the caster's Spirit score, the target is killed, and their spirit is stolen by the caster. If [sum] does not exceed the caster's Spirit score, the target gains a Serious wound.
4. Mighty Wind - You expel a powerful blast of wind. At one [die], it's powerful enough to knock a bird out of the sky. At two [die], it's powerful enough to knock a person off their feet. At three [die], it's powerful enough to knock an elephant off their feet or lift a person [sum] feet backwards in the air. At four [die], it's powerful enough to (temporarily) knock spirits out of their vessels.
5. Untamed Soul - Your vessel cracks and your spirit spills out into a radius of [dice]*10 feet centered on your body. [sum] spirits in the radius must be devoured and erased permanently, this can include your own spell-spirits; you can remove one [dice] from your [sum] to instead devour a Guardian spirit in this way. If a living creature's spirit is devoured in this way, it becomes a mindless beast.
6. Raise Earth - You lift an area of up to [dice] miles (surface area) out of the ground. At one [die], this will create a sandbar or hill. At two [die], it creates a rocky atoll or a large hill. At three-to-four [die], this will create an island or mountain.

Disobediences 

 Friendly

1.  Double the effective range (if applicable), otherwise double the number of targets for the spells duration.
2. The spell fizzles
3. Expend one of your MD spent to cast the spell in addition to any that would expend naturally.
4. Double the duration of the spell (if applicable), otherwise double its potency.
5. You cannot cast for 1d6 rounds.
6. The spell cannot be used for the remainder of the day.

Hostile 

1. Expend all of the MD used to cast the spell.
2. Roll any MD remaining in your pool and add them to the dice used to cast the spell.
3. Change one of the targets of the spell to either yourself or someone you care about if applicable. If the spell isn't harmful, instead it targets something that makes it as inconvenient to use as possible.
4. A different, random spell you know gets cast instead.
5. You cannot cast for the rest of the day.
6. The spell breaks its tether and flees. 

Reverse-Oddomatic Combats

    This post will be detailing a combat system I will be dubbing: "reverse oddomatic"; which isn't technically accurate, butbit almost makes sense.

    Combat in this system has two phases: the attack roll, and the injury roll. The attack roll actually ends up being a standard stat roll, which will be detailed in an upcoming post on character generation, if it is succeeded, or if the player fails their dodge roll, they either deal or are dealt a hit.

    For each hit they receive, they gain an injury. the severity and location of that injury is determined by rolling on the following tables:

Location (1d6)

1.     Arm

2.     Leg

3-4. Torso

5-6. Head

Severity (1d6)        Modifier        Recovery

1. Cosmetic                +0              Overnight

2-4. Minor                  +1               1 week

5-7. Serious                +2             1 month + medical attention.

8. Fatal                        -                You're dead :(

    The severity roll is modified  by two things: armor, which reduces the severity by 3; and active wounds, which increase it as according to the severity table. An active wound is any wound which has not yet healed, and they stack.

    Yes, it's deadly, that is one way in which I draw the similarity to oddomatic combats, in that combat ends rather quickly. But it keeps a few things I like, namely, the ability to put a dodge roll in my games.

    Additionally, combat has lasting consequences. It can put out a character for anywhere from a week to a month in game. If a character goes into a fight without armor, their first hit could leave them out for some time. This puts it in a much less desirable position than other forms of resolving conflicts.

    As usual for my posts about homebrew rules and whatnot, I will end with my disclaimer about it being pure theorycraft that should only be implemented with utmost personal discretion.

Revised Armor System: Introducing Chaos!

I've been thinking a lot about armor lately, and by extension my armor system. It's too complicated, Nobody wants to remember three seemingly random numbers which attempt to mimick real world armor. Its clunky, and ugly. Which is the opposite of what armor is. Armor is pretty and elegant. So a pretty and elegant system is better at mimicking armor, right?

The Old System

The New System:

Okay, the first step, it to make your players describe their attacks. From there you can determine what weapon they're using as well as how they use it. Any weapon can use any type of attack as long as the player can justify it adequately.
After damage is rolled, the defender rolls resistance, which is based on the armor type as listed below.

Textile:
Blunt-d6 , Cut-d4 , Stab- d6

Chain:
Blunt-d6 , Cut-d8 , Stab-d6

Plate:
Blunt-d8 , Cut-d10 , Stab-d8

You do not gain any resistance to melee weapons while you are prone, because at that point any dude can just walk over and stab you.

The average damage tends to rest somewhere between 1-3 pretty consistently based on my current weapons system. And that feels pretty alright to me. Obviously these aren't based on the attacks monsters would necessarily be making, which are much more likely to deal higher amounts of damage, but armor will do a good job of protecting you against other humans.

Why Chaos?

There are a few advantages rolling has over static numbers in this case.

For starters, it gives us a wider range. Previously, I had proposed that Plate reduced all damage by 8, meaning the attacker, at maximum damage with the highest damaging weapon type, deals 2 damage. Which straight up does not work. With this new system, the damage is reduced by a die roll, which means the damage you deal usibg the highest damage weapon type can be anywhere from 9 to 0, which occurs less than half the time unless the die rolls are equal, in which case it's exactly half the time.

The other benefit is that it doesn't force you into doing anything. Previously you were shoehorned into using polearm weapons against anyone wearing plate. Which doesnt make sense. While a polearm would be ideal against an armored opponent, its not like it's invulnerable to everything else.  On the otherhand, its not gonna be as easy on you to take your tiny dagger against a fully armored opponent.

I dunno, maybe my armor system in general is a bad idea. Here's another picture.

All the art in this post was done by Eol, a talented artist who draws people in armor. If you like what you saw, consider checking out his Twitter or Youtube Channel.

Combat Rules - Cementing My GLOG Hack Maybe?

Before I've even started drafting this these rules are already in the google docs of my GLOG hack. But why not write about some of why I made them?

I've basically taken the idea of Pathfinder 2e's Action Economy and dumbed it down a lot. For example, you get 2 actions rather than 3, most things only take 1 action, it's nowhere near as wordy considering it doesn't quite even fill half a page.

Context

Combat

Combat is divided into actions. You have 2 actions during each round during which you can perform any of the following activities:

• Make an attack roll
• Cast a spell
• Move 30 meters
• Pull an item out of a quick inventory slot
• Use a consumable
• Combat Maneuvers

Activities that use 2 actions:

• Pull an item out of a general inventory slot
• Tying a knot, climbing a wall, setting up the weird trap, etc.

Anyways, Im going to get into a little more of what each action entails.

Taken from Here

Attack
Melee and Ranged opposed checks basically. Also of note, I don't really do penalties for range increments on ranged attacks. It's messy and I usually do theater of the mind stuff anyways. As long as it's feasible you can make an attack, do it.

Spellcasting
Doing your wavey-hand chanty stuff. Yes you can cast two spells in a round. What's the big deal? You're just that much more likely to die a horrible wizard death.

Movement
What's up with the 30 meters thing?
Meters are neater than 5ft. and besides that, I don't use squares anyways, I measure the distance with a string if I even bother to measure at all. This is really only here for if I decide to ever use battlemaps, as I usually do theater of the mind stuff.

Quick Inventory Slots
The first three inventory slots. Their numbers are in bold text to make it even easier to see. Basically this is the stuff that's in a quick to grab area, like your sword sitting in the scabbard at your side or the potion strapped to your belt.

Use a Consumable
Okay, you just pulled that potion off your belt. Now chug it. That's your second action.

Combat Maneuvers
Tripping, disarming, throwing your pommel, etc. The kinds of stuff that's not an attack but also kind of an attack. You could spend your turn wresting someone to the ground then stabbing them with your dagger, for example.

General Inventory Slots
I mean, only six seconds to dig around in your bag is generous to be honest.

Basically anything that takes time
That's more or less what the last part is. Mostly up to GM discretion. You might think stuff like climbing should be part of move, sure do that, why not.

_   _   _

It seems like it would be easier to understand to me at least. Traditionally you have your move action and your standard action. Each one has different activities that can be done during that time, and the players have to be told they can do other things, at least in my experience.

With this method, it's just: Alright, what two things do you want to do this turn.

While as written, you can do the same thing twice in a turn, keep in mind that that's all you get to do that turn. Though if you wanted you could just rule you can't do the same action twice. I personally like the idea you can just do something twice though. It adds a little bit less rigidity to the system.

I both do and don't like the two actions activities. On the one hand, it makes sense they'd take longer. On the other hand, perhaps it encourages players not to do that kind of thing? digging through your bag, and setting a tripwire takes two full turns, meaning you're maybe less likely to do that kind of thing. It's not like its bad to do that, but a player may consider that a less optimal choice in the moment when its maybe a better choice.

That's a communication thing though. You can let your players know that kind of thing. Sort of like the sheet of player tips that I can't seem to find.

Anyways, if you have any thoughts, please shoot it into the comments. It's not that Im not open to discussing things elsewhere, but I feel it's useful for questions and ideas to be shared along with what promted them.

Another GLOG hack!

I wrote a GLOG hack, who cares!

Here's a list of what I changed/added, might be more but meh:

- Modifiers for Attack Rolls
- Weapons and Armour
- Condensed Core Classes
- Added Lighting rules
- Section on Magic Items
- Changed Magic Item Identification
- Hex-Crawling Rules

Mostly just quality of life changes, the core of the game is still the same. I have a smaller number of classes in the actual rulebook, but the intention of that is keeping players from playing things jarring to the setting, so they're basically only the generic ones.

Most of the rule adds are seen elsewhere on this blog, but they have been condensed/altered to fit in the book well.

Anyways, here's the link:
the GLOG: Deadly Dungeons Edition
Character Sheet

In other news, still trying to get work on my setting, just getting back into it after life kept me away from it, also realizing it was much more ambitious a project than I thought. Expect multiple books on it some time in the distant future.

Some Lighting Rules

Huh, some of my newer posts are actually starting to hit the level of views my crappy Pathfinder homebrew got, does this mean I'm accumulating a small amount of popularity in the OSR community? I'll try not to let it go to my head.

Anyways, I've been lacking in my use of lighting so far in my time running games, and it's put me in the mind to start brainstorming my own (Though I am horrendously bad at actually putting my homebrew into my games). So, here's my quick and dirty brainstorm for lighting rules:

Torches:

You have two types of torches: torches you buy, and torches you make. Torches you buy are going to last longer than torches you quickly make by grabbing some grass or a tree branch.

I should probably get some form of time passage for dungeon exploration typed out before I go any further.

A dungeon room takes either five or ten minutes to explore, depending on how easily the players come up with a solution, or how reckless they are being. For example, if they bumble about down the hall it's not going to take them long (Unless they need to unimpale themselves 😉), whereas them carefully searching every nook and cranny for the trigger to a trap is going to take quite a bit longer.


Now let's get back to torches. A shitty torch will probably last 30 minutes, while a good torch lasts an hour. Lanterns last days, I have a kerosene lantern that I've ran multiple days and have never had to refill, those things last a while.

How much do torches light up? (For simplicity's sake, I'm going to make it so all forms of lighting cover the same radius, the duration is probably plenty reason to invest in better lighting). five feet from you is bright light, and thirty feet from you is dim light. This means that you need to move pretty close to something to see it as more than vague shadow.

Look at this helpful diagram I made!
The grey circle is 5'.

Of course anything past dim light is simply heard, which is a great way to make dungeons creepier.

Just this photo spooks me.

Anyways, this is just a brainstorm I wrote whilst typing this post, so any feedback in the comments is appreciated.

Hex Travel: Concept Ruleset for Exploring Hexes.

Hex Size: 6 miles side to side.

Travel Speed is based on movement. The party travels at the speed of the slowest party member. The distance the party can travel during one watch is 1/3 of their movement score.

Watches

One watch is a four hour period of time. There are six watches in a day. Players need two watches to rest. If next to each other it is a full rest. Players need one watch period to set up camp. This effectively means that players can move [move] hours per day, unless they decide to explore or forage, which also takes up one watch. Preparing food for your ‘lunch’ occurs when you set up camp. There are a series of actions you can choose to do during each watch:

Travel when you choose to travel, you move at 1/3 of the slowest party member’s move. If your total travel distance exceeds the slowest party member’s movement, you gain 1 exhaustion.

Rest Resting restores 1d6 +Level HP and one Exhaustion. If you take two rests in a row, instead all hit points and exhaustion are automatically removed. You need a total of two rests a turn to stay well rested, for each rest you miss in a day, you gain one exhaustion.

Set up Camp This is when you set up everything to sleep, or create a base camp to explore the surrounding area, perhaps over the next few days, just don’t get lost.

Forage Foraging takes up 1 watch, and scores you a neat 1d4 rations. You can also make a hunting skill check to turn this it into a d6.

Explore Exploring makes it easier to encounter cool things in the hex you are in, Since you are spreading about rather than making progress walking around, it only makes logical sense that this be a separate watch action rather than a half speed feature or whatever.

Exploration Rules

Each hex has a d12 encounter table (maybe this is too much?), the first six things are the interesting and cool hard to find stuff, so a town isn’t going to be on this list, but the secret shrine to the blasphemous blood god in the surrounding woodlands would be. When you choose to explore rather than just wander through the hex, remove the last six entries from this encounter table. This means that you are guaranteed to encounter at least one interesting thing.

Hex Maps

The world map is divided into regions, each of these regions will have a hex map made up for it. These hexes will be labeled from left to right with lines like A1, A4, B1, etc. and will have an encounter table and possibly location keyed up to it.

Numbered like this, but the rest is not what I'm thinking at all.

Exhaustion

Exhaustion basically takes up an inventory slot, and will eventually overencumber you. Overencumbrance reduces your movement speed and will therefore make you move slower, it’s a self-destructive cycle if you for whatever reason decide rest takes up too much danged time.

And there we have it, my completely un-polished, un-refined, un-playtested ruleset for hex traveling. I would start testing it out, but it’s not relevant to my current campaign, at least not yet. I’m just writing this down as a primer for when I get more involved in my new setting (I think it’s going to be called Mahkah right now). If anyone has any feedback let me know in the comments or however else you think is comvenient.

Realism: Proper Armor

Armor in RPGs is often misrepresented, not only is the armor class system flawed, but the types of armor, as well as levels of protection among them is also misaligned. This post will be my attempt at both explaining the problems, as well as providing my own solution.

Let’s start with the Armor Class system. In the armor class system, your level of armor as well as your dexterity score influence how likely someone is to damage you. Do you see the problem? It actually makes perfect sense for your dexterity score to influence your Armor Class, after all, that represents your skill at dodging, but the armor doesn’t help you dodge the blow, does it? I thought not, it simply lessens the impact of the blow, and generally pretty well. So while the idea of Armor Class isn’t wholly unnecessary, perhaps armor should be a separate part of the whole thing.

The next part to discuss is levels of protection. You generally see in system rules three little sections of armor: Light Armor, not that protective, but provides free movement; Medium Armor, more protective than light, but also more restrictive; and Heavy Armor, really protective, but really restrictive. Well, those are some pretty misinformed rules.

Light armor is often interpreted as leather armor, and if you’re going to use leather in your games, more power to you, just know that leather armor is only a fantasy trope because of movies. Historically, it was all but nonexistent. Anyways, leather isn’t very protective unless it’s thick, and thick leather is hard to move. Combine that with how expensive large amounts of quality leather would have been, and you have expensive, restrictive, and ultimately ineffective armor, what’s the point?

Ah, but here comes the gambeson, a light, cheap, and effective armor; made by sewing together layers of linen, which is basically the same idea as a bullet resistant vest. Gambeson was pretty good at protecting you, unless your opponent has just sharpened their sword to a razor edge; in which case you will get hit, but only for the first few hits, because sharpened edges dull quickly. Gambeson were also good against stabbing and impact based weapons. Remember how I told you they were similar to a bullet proof vest? The layering of thick fibered fabrics allows impacts to spread outwards before they do any damage to the actual person, which means the strike is significantly lessened.

Medium armor is thrown in as chain, I won’t say much about this; except that chain wasn’t much more protective than gambeson, the only difference being it specialized in defending against cuts rather than stabs or impacts.

Heavy armor, often plate or similar steel armors is put out there as a human tank, difficult to move in, but highly protective. In reality, it is both highly protective and very easy to move in; because it was designed to be. There are still issues with plate though.

First of all, they still have weight. Though not enough to make them clunky, it is enough to tire you over time. That’s why you wouldn’t want to wear it all day long. The second problem is visibility. Though there were helmets designed to allow for a better range of vision, they would always be sacrificing protection.

You probably couldn’t give two rats on a stick about any of this, so I’ll move on to the houserule you’re all here for.

Light Armor (e.g. Gambeson):

   Damage Resistance: 6 Piercing, Bludgeoning; 4 Slashing.

Medium Armor (e.g. Chain):

   Damage Resistance 5 Piercing, Bludgeoning; 7 Slashing.

Heavy Armor (e.g. Plate):

   Damage Resistance 8

You have no damage reduction from armor while prone.

Dodge is your ability to avoid getting hit, and is calculated as 10 + Dex mod.

The following system also puts in place a variety of historical strategies. For example if swords do 1d8 damage, I need to use a polearm on the guy in plate. It also puts to use the idea of wrestling an armored opponent to the ground so you could stab them through the eye slit.

I feel that the system is simple enough to be OSR, but it also makes the game a lot more strategic. Also, as a nice little bonus, you can make it so that damage to armor needs to be repaired, creating a nice little way to tax your players.

Armor needs to be repaired when it’s been used. In order to simulate the damage done to your armor, keep track of every time your armor fails to protect you, which basically means your D.R. is not enough to prevent you from taking damage. For every time this happens, your armor gains a damage point.

Damage points can be removed from armor by paying a smith to repair it.

I’m not going to put a set price on repairs because players should be allowed to haggle.

Realism: Better Weapons

Do any of us like realism in our RPGs? I know I do, that's why I'm writing this, a post that fixes weapons in RPGs, because I think they suck.

Within each of these categories are specific weapons, they deal different types of damage, and sometimes have abilities.

Daggers

First things first, daggers are not main weapons, actually, neither are swords, but we'll get to that later. I'd put them at 1d6 damage like they are in any other system, except they provoke an attack if the target is not prone. That way you can still use them, but it at least holds the obvious danger that close-quarters fighting would hold. Also, any light bludgeoning weapons would never have enough force to deal lethal damage, so there's also that.

Types

Rondel Dagger: Damage: piercing, +1 to hit vs. plate armor.

Stiletto: Damage: piercing, slashing.
Baton: Damage: bludgeoning, nonlethal.

Swords (Also Axes and Hammers)

Swords were only really used by themselves in duels or as civilian self-defense. A peasant probably won't have a sword, but anyone else will. Something to clear up, because maybe a lot of you know this, but maybe not. Long swords were strictly two-handed weapons. If you want a weapon that could be one or two-handed, that would be a hand-and-a-half, or bastard sword, a one-handed sword would be known as an arming sword. But keep in mind, they were all just called "swords".

As far as axes and hammers go, they were weapons used in the past, but they weren't the massive two-sided things we picture them as, they generally had small heads, that would carry a similar weight to a sword. They would even hit harder, since all the momentum is concentrated in the head.

Weapons in this category deal 1d8 damage.

Types

Arming Sword: Damage: piercing, slashing; one-handed; can be used with a shield.

Bastard Sword: Damage: piercing, slashing, bludgeoning; can be treated as an arming or long sword.

Long Sword: Damage: piercing, slashing, bludgeoning; grant a +1 AC bonus.

Battle Axe: Damage: slashing; can sunder wooden hafts, -1 to AC because they leave you open without a shield.

War-Hammer: Damage: bludgeoning, piercing; +1 to hit vs. plate-mail.
Maces: Damage: bludgeoning; +1 to hit vs. mail.

Polearms

not drawn to scale

Polearms were the main type of weapon from the medieval period. Why would you fight somebody within inches of feet of you when you could put a 6-12" pole between you and your enemy? There are so many different types of polearms, I'm honestly just gonna put a general writeup and give you a picture of some.

Polearms deal 1d10 damage.

Types

Piercing Polearms: +1 to hit vs. chain armor.

Bludgeoning Polearms: on a critical hit, concuss an opponent in plate-mail.

Slashing Polearms: +1 to hit vs. lightly or unarmored opponents.

If a polearm has multiple damage types, apply multiple effects, and just make it cost more or something if your worried about balance.

Source